Privacy
by Gilded
Summary: Wally West gets taken to the Watchtower for questioning. Before the events of star-crossed, so no one knows each other's secret identities. Also, before whenever batman figured out Flash's identity.
1. Chapter I

**Title:** Privacy

**Characters:** Flash, Bats, and Superman

**Word Count**: 820

**Rating:** PG-13 for language

**Disclaimer:** Not mine, never will be, and no profit is being made from this story.

**Summary:** Wally West gets taken to the Watchtower for questioning. Before the events of star-crossed, so no one knows each other's secret identities. Also, before whenever batman figured out Flash's identity.

_A/N: So, I went back to review this and decided to re-write it and, muse willing, finish the fic. The basic information hasn't changed, but I'd recommend reading the revised version._

~**JL**~

Wally West, the handsomest, most dashing Superhero who ever lived, walked out of the Biology building at his college and suddenly froze at the site of two, _horribly familiar_, figures walking briskly towards him.

Normally, he wouldn't have been worried about the two, but that was only when he was in full Flash gear.

Right now, he was still Wally West; bottomless pit, straight "A" student, accident waiting to happen, and, most importantly, the person least connected to the superheroing community on campus.

He'd spent enough time actively encouraging that last one to think he was safe.

As Normal-Joe Wally, he'd always tried to come across as so ridiculously clumsy that people would never suspect him of being a superhero, particularly not the Flash.

As the Flash, he'd always pretended to be so incredibly dumb that anyone sniffing around for his identity wouldn't even suspect he was in college, much less a high achieving student. And hey, the badies constantly underestimating him was a great perk in addition to the whole "protecting his secret identity" thing.

He made absolutely sure his two lives _never_ cross-pollinated. He hung out with his Flash-friends as Flash, and his Wally-friends as Wally. That was it, the end, nothing more to the story.

A large, powerful hand fell on his shoulder and his eyes met the gazes, one more a glare, of two men he had gotten to know quit well as the Flash in the six months he had worked with them. Two men who shouldn't of had any reason to seek out one Wally West.

Batman and Superman.

'_Damn, this is going to be awkward_.'

~**JL**~

He walked quickly towards the young, red haired teen that had just left what he suspected was some type of science building.

'_Hard to think a kid could be involved.'_

"Wow, he looks too young to be in college, doesn't he?" Superman spouted to his right. "What's his name anyway?"

"His name's Wallace Rudolph West. He started school early, skipped 2nd grade, and went straight to college after high school which explains him being too young, as you put it. His birth certificate puts him at only 17."

Batman stiffened a bit after saying that, he hated when kids were involved with his work.

"He lost both parents to a car crash at the age of nine, and was sent to the Central City Orphanage."

"Poor kid."

"It gets better, a year later to the day his class took a field trip to the Central City Forensics lab and, due to a freak lightning strike, he ended up in a hospital bed for a week with some nasty third degree chemical burns. Apparently, that's the reason he only wears long sleeved shirts. He had high grades all through high school, and received a full scholarship to Central City University. He currently lives by himself in the school dorms."

"Looks like someone's been a busy bat" Superman arched his eyebrows as his glaze slipped towards the Dark Knight.

"I don't slack when it comes to possible threats"

At this, Supes walked a bit farther away from Batman, just to be safe.

"But I have to admit, the kid doesn't seem the type to be in a criminal organization."

And he really didn't. Wally, as he liked to be called, was well liked by most of the people he met.

He didn't have any behavioral problems, besides eating excessively in class, and even volunteered regularly at local orphanages. On paper, he looked like the perfect kid.

"But people aren't always what they seem," he added, frowning a bit more and intensifying his patented Bat-glare as they approached Wally.

'_Funny'_

As soon as Wally had seen them approaching, he'd frozen to the spot.

In his extensive career as a masked vigilantly, he'd noticed that when civilians see a superhero approaching they're nearly always initially surprised. Then, depending on the person and the superhero coming their way, their expressions usually range anywhere from extremely excited to distrustful and weary.

Criminals, on the other hand, almost always show varying degrees of the same expression: _fear_.

That was the first thing Bruce saw on Wally's face before he quickly, _almost too quickly_, relaxed his facial muscles and pretended to look indifferent to the two superheroes moving in his direction.

Also something criminals tended to do.

They walked up to the teen and Superman slipped his hand on Wally's shoulder to deter any would-be escape attempts.

Suspects always seemed to think they could run away. Like criminals always seemed to think that throwing a gun at Superman after already emptying a clip into his chest would, by some miracle, be the thing to finally take him down

In both cases, they usually just succeeded in getting themselves hurt.

Wally visibly paled as Bruce met his gaze.

He stuttered out a shaky "Y…yes?" before attempting to take a small step back.

"Is your name Wally West?"

~**JL**~

_Post Note: So, I updated and consolidated the first two chapters. I'll update the remaining chapter at some point then get to work on writing new content. Bear with me though, I have so much homework my free time has almost dwindled to nothing. _

_-With love, Gilded._


	2. Chapter II

**Title:** Privacy

**Characters:** Flash, Bats, and Superman

**Word Count**: 589

**Rating:** PG-13 for language

**Disclaimer:** Not mine, never will be, and no profit is being made from this story.

**Summary:** Wally West gets taken to the Watchtower for questioning. Before the events of star-crossed, so no one knows each other's secret identities. Also, before whenever batman figured out Flash's identity.

_A/N: I didn't really change anything significant here. Just cleaned up some awkwardly worded sentences._

~**JL**~

Wally was screwed. So very, very screwed.

He was just chilling, minding his own business when **BAM**; surprise mini-interrogation by Supes and the freaking Batman.

Worst part was, Wally had no clue what he could have done to generate the conversation he was currently having.

Supes had, for some reason, felt the need to use his shoulder as a stress ball while Bats did his best to find a way to actually maim someone with his glare. Too bad he seemed to be the target.

Had he mentioned he was screwed?

"Are you Wally West?" Supes' grip leveled-up from being mildly uncountable to really freaking uncomfortable as Bats repeated his question.

Lying would only succeed in Wally being stalked to his house and later hung over a building or worse until he answered truthfully. If six months of working with Batman had taught him anything, it was that.

So, seeing no other option, Wally slouched his shoulders, put on a surprisingly genuine look of confusion tinged with a bit a fear, and mumbled out a shaky "Yea?" Inflecting his voice _just so_ that his answer came out as a question.

Besides really downplaying his intelligence as the Flash, his personality didn't change significantly whether he was in or out of costume. Right now, that was a major problem.

If he somehow tripped Bats' Déjà vu sensors, the Dark Knight was just paranoid enough to look into it. And that would be extraordinarily bad for Wally, 'cause when Batman decided he was going to figure something out it got figured, usually within a week.

So for now, Wally would play a completely unhandsome, charm lacking, totally not a superhero geeky college student.

It was the perfect plain. Or the perfect plain as far as Wally was concerned.

Which he ruined about .05 seconds later when he let a smug expression fall on his face that Batman immediately noticed. Bats then proceeded to raise an eyebrow that clearly said 'I am suspicious of you'.

Well, that was what Wally imagined Bats' eyebrows would be saying if he could see them underneath the bat-cowl.

_'Maybe I should look into inventing more emotive masks.' _

~**JL**~

Kid was really suspicious.

One second he's pretending to be meek and shy, suspicious enough on its own, and the next he's wearing an expression that could only be described as disgustingly smug.

He should know, he'd spent a good portion of his life wearing that exact expression out in public to keep up his playboy persona.

Bruce looked hard and long at Wally. How a child who was so obviously bad at hiding his emotions had managed to become a member of an international crime syndicate was beyond him. But he was going to find out.

But not on a college campus surrounded by curious students.

"We need you to come with us for a while" Superman tightened his grip just a bit more causing Wally to flinch.

"Well fellas, I'd really like to come with you and all but I still have classes and other… stuff to do. So maybe we can reschedule or something?"

"Or something, you're coming with us. The league will send a notice to your remaining classes." Bruce made sure his tone was extra icy as he turned toward were they had left the javelin.

He had been waiting nearly a year to get his hands on someone from the origination he believed had set in motion the attack in CSU's chemistry lab two weeks ago.

He wasn't going to waste this chance.

~**JL**~

_-With love, Gilded. _


	3. Chapter III

_**Title:**__ Privacy_

_**Characters: **__Just Bats and Flash this chapter_

_**Word Count:**__ 1,108_

_**Rating: **__PG-13 for language_

_**Disclaimer:**__ Not mine, never will be, and no profit if being made from this story_

_**Summary:**__ Wally West gets taken to the Watchtower for questioning. Before the events of star-crossed, so no one knows each other's secret identities. Also, before whenever Batman figured out Flash's identity._

_A/N: I think this may be my favorite chapter yet :D _

~**JL**~

Wally was confused.

So confused, in fact, that he honestly couldn't remember a time he had ever been more confused in his life; and considering his life, that was quit the achievement.

Why was he so confused?

He was currently being held in the bat-interrogation room, located in the watch tower, being giving a truly epic bat-glare, located on non-other than its name sake's face, all the while being told they had iron clad evidence that he was part of some shadowy organization, location unknown, old Bats had been chasing for around a year now.

Oh, and the evidence? _Video evidence._

Wally was just about to ask if the guy they'd obviously mistaken for him in the video was sporting a goatee when his brain finally decided to register a distinct lack of monologing coming from Batsy.

Over the course of the countless long, tedious, boring league meetings he'd been subjected to, Wally had learned the subtitle art of tuning Bats out when his talking exceeded five minutes. So, while he had caught the thing about them having _freaking video evidence_ of him doing some wrong, he honestly had no idea what Bats had been saying for however long he'd been zoned-out.

And now, Batman was silent.

That didn't bode well.

After glaring at Wally for a full, highly uncomfortable minute, the Dark Knight silently rose from his chair, walked over to ,what Wally had personally named, the _"freak-out the interrogatie with all the awesome evidence we've collected"_ TV set in the corner, and turned it on with a faint clicking sound.

On the screen, three young men entered a room that looked suspiciously like the main Chemistry lab back on campus. The three young men, who he now recognized as himself and two fellow classmates, started making their way towards one of the lab stations when, suddenly, a bright light appeared in the corner of the room. In a matter of seconds, the light filled the small screen of the TV set then dissipated, leaving only the scene of Wally sprawled on the floor on top of the two other boys.

He _remembered _this happening.

And that, oddly, was the most disconcerting thing about this whole situation.

He'd fully expected to watch a doppelganger of himself breaking ninja-style into some shady warehouse to steal something or another.

Because honestly, that happened more often than Wally was strictly comfortable with.

Instead, he was faced with a video of his normal, handsome self saving a couple of fellow students from certain doom.

He'd been able to throw himself on top of Josh and Shiroma just before a cloud of shrapnel and debris would have ripped them all to shreds.

When the authorities had come and watched the footage, they had labeled him a hero. Wanted to give him a medal and everything. Wally had refused, of course, insisting that it was what anyone would have done in his situation. He _was _trying to keep a reasonably low profile after all.

But still, last time Wally checked humility wasn't exactly a sign of nefarious deeds.

So what about this video had pinged Bats' "evil is going down" radar?

Apparently Wally's look of mild confusion wasn't the reaction Old Batsy was hoping for, 'cause after the video had ran its course he then proceeded to replay the tape in super slow-mo.

Still nothing unusual as far as Wally could tell. Even on the slower setting.

They walk in, explosion starts, he, quite heroically, throws himself on top of the others just in the nick of-

Oh.

Bats had drawn a reasonable conclusion about there being something up with Wally West.

He really had messed up.

~**JL**~

Bruce sat back and watched as the video began to play. He'd seen the tape at least a hundred times by now, looking at it from every angle to make sure he hadn't missed anything.

He hadn't.

On the screen, three college students were entering the main chemistry lab at CCU. One of these students sporting a flaming mop of red hair. Then, as the trio approached the nearest work station, the room suddenly exploded in a dazzling flash of light.

By all rights, all three would have been dead if not for the quick actions of one Wally West. And that, right there, was the problem.

_Quick_

Bruce could tell from the kid's face that he still didn't see what was so wrong with his actions. So, nice guy that Bruce is, he played the video again. Frame by frame.

With the new, slower pace the video was taking, it was simple to see the moment Wally moved to cover his friends before the light from the explosion overwhelmed the screen.

And… there it was.

Wally's mouth dropped in a silent "oh" as he seemed to come to the same conclusion Bruce had two weeks ago when he'd first managed to get his hands on the footage.

"You reacted to that explosion fast. So fast, in fact, that I have about twenty different models that say you reacted faster than what _should_ be humanly possible."

Bruce's tone was light, conversational even.

"Well, what shouldn't have been possible unless you knew there was going to be an explosion beforehand, that is."

Bruce paused a bit, letting the gravity of the situation sink in, before continuing.

"So, I'm going to tell you my current theory. I think you planted those explosives, or, at the very least, let someone into the lab to plant them. Maybe nobody was supposed to get hurt, maybe they were. I don't know."

Bruce shifted his body forward, squaring his shoulders slightly as he did so. The picture of menacing.

"But what I do know is that you went back to that room, knowing the bomb was about to explode, to save those two boys."

Bruce relaxed back into his chair, letting his tone soften as he did so. He was still just dealing with a kid. A good kid who had probably just gotten mixed-up in something so big he didn't know how to get himself out.

After all, sociopaths, like the people who worked for the organization Bruce was investing, didn't go back to save bystanders that got snared in their traps.

"I think you're a good kid at heart, so you've still got a shot of getting out of this without ruining your life."

Bruce slipped a relatively small, by bat-standards at least, file folder onto the table, opening it as he did so to spread the pictures and police reports held inside in front of Wally.

"All you need to do is tell me everything about the Odium."

~**JL**~

_Post Note: How will Wally get out of this? As always, expect sporadic updates in the future._

_- With love, Gilded_


End file.
